Hope

Let us take a moment of silence for House Bill 1483 and Senate Bill 2692, the deceptively named “academic freedom” bills.
Time of death: 6 p.m.
I doubt they will rest in peace, though.

In other hopeful news: According to Box Office Mojo, the theatre count for Expelled in its third week has dropped by 386 to 655 and the daily numbers have dropped to $157,191 or $151/theatre for Monday, $162,396 or $156/theatre for Tuesday and $159,273 or $153/theatre for Wednesday.

Farewell to bad arguments about good science.

Mark Mathis is still pleased with the $5.8 million even though earlier reports had indicated that success was defined as $12 million for the first weekend.

Great, I was wondering why there still was so many theaters showing the Excrete in earlier statistics.

The category Smallest Drops should be a derivative, and it has a rank roughly corresponding to its economical rank. That could mean the faithful public (for some suitable definition of “faith”) isn’t terribly interested in supporting it.

Only Panda’s Thumb would gloat over the defeat of academic freedom in Florida.

[PvM: William is confused, academic freedom has won. ID’s attempts have nothing to do with academic freedom. And William knows this.]

Not to mention how William is confused about Darwinism and the holocaust arguing that Darwinism was essential for the holocaust to have happened.
When William was unable to defend this position, he created a strawman that evolanders (sic) had denied any role for Darwinism in the rise of Nazism.
When I presented him with comments from Luther which were directly anti-semitic and when I showed him comments by Goebbels, he doubted me being a Christian.

Fascinating how showing that when on uses the same ‘logic’ one can link Nazism and Christianity it somehow is rejected based on the idea that those people were not Christians. And yet, when a link is made between Nazism and Malthusian ideas, there is obviously a link with Darwinism.

Only Panda’s Thumb would gloat over the defeat of academic freedom in Florida.

[PvM: William is confused, academic freedom has won. ID’s attempts have nothing to do with academic freedom. And William knows this.]

Not to mention how William is confused about Darwinism and the holocaust arguing that Darwinism was essential for the holocaust to have happened.
When William was unable to defend this position, he created a strawman that evolanders (sic) had denied any role for Darwinism in the rise of Nazism.
When I presented him with comments from Luther which were directly anti-semitic and when I showed him comments by Goebbels, he doubted me being a Christian.

Fascinating how showing that when on uses the same ‘logic’ one can link Nazism and Christianity it somehow is rejected based on the idea that those people were not Christians. And yet, when a link is made between Nazism and Malthusian ideas, there is obviously a link with Darwinism.

Oh how blind we can be…

I wouldn’t say that this is blindness, per se.

It’s more of a selective blocking of topics due to shifting the plank lodged in (William)’s eye. That, and trying to hit people with the plank, too.

It’s more of a selective blocking of topics due to shifting the plank lodged in (William)’s eye. That, and trying to hit people with the plank, too.

And yet the level of self deception seems to run deep.

That goes without saying: Really, people like William Wallace have been lying to everyone, including themselves, so much that lies are the only thing holding their little minds together. But, the thing is, people can not develop in a healthy manner if they smother themselves in falsehoods.

In our earlier exchange at the Florida Citizens for Science blog, I asked you what “alternative possibilities” to evolution would be considered in the context of the “academic freedom” bills. You were honest enough then to admit that it was intelligent design:

James F,

There is a film coming on Friday that may answer the question you’re asking. If you cannot wait, you could listen to the audio linked to at Intelligent Design and Academic Freedom by NPR.

Intelligent design is based on supernatural causation and as such it is not science. Please, let’s be accurate when discussing these bills: it’s not about “academic freedom;” it’s about introducing the non-scientific concept of intelligent design into the science curriculum by government fiat.

Only Panda’s Thumb would gloat over the defeat of academic freedom in Florida.

“Academic freedom” is pushing religion into science to the detriment of time to actually discuss any advanced science, “complexity” is simplicity, and “ID science” is a religious scam that stumbles further from empirical facts for each day.

Really, with religious doublespeak like that, who needs more arguments to demonstrate for outsiders that fundamentalist creationism is a political means of trying to achieve a “Knave New World” on a cult basis. Thanks for making scientists point.

As an outsider, I get the impression that too many Americans switch off their critical faculties when they hear the word ‘freedom’. What are the grounds for allowing high school teachers to have ‘academic freedom’ to teach whatever they like? Sure, they should have the freedom to espouse different views outside school but in the class they should be required to teach the curriculum which, presumably, was devised by people who are competent in the area. If teachers have any problems with the content of the curriculum they should behave in a professional manner and take it up with those who planned it, not abandon it and invent their own curriculum as they go.

As an outsider, I get the impression that too many Americans switch off their critical faculties when they hear the word ‘freedom’. What are the grounds for allowing high school teachers to have ‘academic freedom’ to teach whatever they like? Sure, they should have the freedom to espouse different views outside school but in the class they should be required to teach the curriculum which, presumably, was devised by people who are competent in the area. If teachers have any problems with the content of the curriculum they should behave in a professional manner and take it up with those who planned it, not abandon it and invent their own curriculum as they go.

No it is not to teach whatever they like. And they are taking the proper route. In Fla they are trying to get legislation so that the weaknesses in Darwin’s theory can be discussed. Right now criticism of the theory is not allowed.

And we are not talking about ‘evolution’ here. No one is saying that evolution does not happen. It is Darwinism

In Fla they are trying to get legislation so that the weaknesses in Darwin’s theory can be discussed. Right now criticism of the theory is not allowed.

Bullshit. Darwin made many mistakes, and didn’t even know we had genes. Not only is discussion of these facts allowed, most of us in the reality-based community would insist on it, since the overturning of those mistakes played a crucial role in our biological history. Now perhaps you meant something else when you said “Darwin’s theory”, but if so, you should have used the proper phrase for it rather than trying to sneak unwarranted assumptions into the argument by playing semantic games.

And we are not talking about ‘evolution’ here. No one is saying that evolution does not happen. It is Darwinism

OK, well, WE, those of us in the scientific community, aren’t talking about Darwinism. It is modern evolutionary theory that should be taught as the best science we have when it comes to biology. So stop being dishonest and deal with the real issue.

In Fla they are trying to get legislation so that the weaknesses in Darwin’s theory can be discussed.

What weaknesses? Bear in mind that Jonathan Wells got a PhD in evolution specifically so he could find weaknesses in the theory of evolution and has failed. Do you seriously believe that high school students who have studied the subject for less than 10 days have a realistic chance of finding any?

And we are not talking about ’evolution’ here. No one is saying that evolution does not happen.

I did not mention evolution, but surely you are not saying that all of the proponents of the bill accept that humans and apes have a common ancestor?

Expelled had another down weekend at the boxoffice, dropping another 51% from the previous weekend. Looks like it’ll gross about $7 mil. at the box office, and they’ll probably just give the DVD away. It will mostly collect dust in Church libraries.

Well Bobby has conclusively demonstrated that he doesn’t know the meaning of the words creationism, “Darwinism” or evolution. He claims to believe that evolution occurred (by that we can assume he means microevolution, however he defines that), but he refuses to acknowledge the evidence for macroevolution (no I don’t want him to try to define that either).

Criticism of Darwin is not allowed huh, well criticize away. Got any evidence that Darwin was wrong? Got any evidence for “intelligent intervention”. Any and all evidence is welcome as it always is in real science. You don’t need legislation to criticize theories in science, all you need is evidence.

Having no explanation for any of the evidence and no alternative to present, he simply tries to confuse the issue by using terms ambiguously until everyone gets frustrated and gives up. Fine Bobby, remain in ignorance, but everyone can see that you have no answers, only word games. If we ignore him I’m sure he will eventually go away.